Heresy 39

[Black Crow]

Its Tuesday again and welcome to Heresy 39, this week’s edition of the thread that offers an alternative view of the Song of Ice and Fire.

Its all about challenging orthodoxy, as we try to figure out what’s really going on not in the Game of Thrones but the Song of Ice and Fire. We reject the easy assumptions that the Others are evil incarnate; that the Children of the Forest will give Bran the knowledge of how to defeat the Others and that Jon is Azor Ahai, and will save Westeros astride one of Dany’s amazing dragons before taking his rightful place alongside her on the Iron Throne as Jon Targaryen First of his Name.

After all, as GRRM himself has stated:

…it was always my intention: to play with the reader’s expectations. Before I was a writer I was a voracious reader and I am still, and I have read many, many books with very predictable plots. As a reader, what I seek is a book that delights and surprises me. I want to not know what is gonna happen. For me, that’s the essence of storytelling and for this reason I want my readers to turn the pages with increasing fever: to know what happens next. There are a lot of expectations, mainly in the fantasy genre, which you have the hero and he is the chosen one, and he is always protected by his destiny. I didn’t want it for my books.

Instead we think it far more important that if R+L really does =J, it is more important that he is the son of Lyanna Stark rather than the lost heir to the Iron Throne, and far from being Azor Ahai he and his magical white direwolf are probably on the other side.

As to that Other side, we look closely at who or what the Others really are, noting both GRRM’s reference to them being like the Sidhe made of ice and to the way they behave not as an invading army but like the Wild Hunt of legend. Inevitably then this means drawing not just on the books themselves but on the real world mythologies, chiefly Celtic but Norse as well, which underpin Martin’s version of the Faerie realms, leading us through the Mabinogion, the Tain bo Culaidh and the Norse Eddas amongst others to discover Bran the Blessed, Tam Lin, Cu Chulainn and above all the Morrigan – the Crow Goddess, associated with death and with three human aspects as maiden, mother and crone.

It was the Crone, according to Catelyn Stark, who let the first raven (all ravens are crows) into the world and we note the way in which crows dominate the whole story, which is why some of us have our suspicions about their true significance, because after all, according to the Ironborn they belong not to the Children but to the Storm God – and oddly enough as it happens the Goddess of the Wind is another attribute of the Morrigan. The crows in short appear to be players rather than convenient vessels for warging.

Conversely its hard to avoid the fact that the Children (who so far have conspicuously said nothing to Bran about the Others) are not just of the Forest, but of the Darkness as well, that darkness feared and hated by Melisandre and the followers of the Lord of Light. Certainly whatever the real motives of the Children, it can cheerfully be assumed that they are no friends of the Red pyromaniacs.

We also look at the Wall itself of course and of late have come to a certain consensus that it is not a defensive structure at all but marks the magical boundary between the realms of Ice (or Faerie), and Men and given the curious silence in the histories as to when and how it was built, some of us have come to think that it was not built after the Long Night to prevent the return of the Others but is much, much older. We are also agreed that it is the Wall itself which is at the heart of what’s wrong with Martin’s World and that it must come down.

As heretics we neither promote nor defend a particular viewpoint, in fact we argue quite a lot, but we do reckon that the Starks’ role in all of this is a lot darker and more ambiguous than once it seemed. They are after all the Kings of Winter.

If you’re already actively involved in the Heresy business it needs no further introduction. If you’re new, or simply intimidated by the sheer scale of it all, not to mention the astonishing speed with which it moves, and wonder what we’re talking about and why we’ve come to these peculiar ideas, just ask. We’re friendly and we don’t mind going over old ground again, especially with a fresh pair of eyes.

All that we ask is that the debate be conducted by reference to the text, with respect for the ideas of others, and above all great good humour.

[Little Wing]

Here's a nice wiki page. Should we spice it up with heresy stuff? :devil:

[Gar Weg Wun Sygerrik]

Yo, I heard der be heresy in hur.

[Little Wing]

Yo, I heard der be heresy in hur.

Damn right.

:leaving:

[Tyryan Lannister]

Yo, I heard der be heresy in hur.

"Hodor... Hodor Hodor," Hodor shook his head in agreement.

[Black Wolf Smith]

Predicting a natural, science based comet is very easy Predicting a magical based one in a made up fantasy world? possibly not

While you do make a point about it being magic, we aren't talking about people knowing about it. We are talking about a hiddened beings of magic knowing and doing things to prepare for its coming.

If we believe that all these "chess" peices were put in to play before it came, something did infact know that it was coming.

for Ice

the Others returning

Direwolves being sent south of the Wall.

A return of Wargs to the Starks

For Fire

Red Priest in Westeros

Setting up the birth of Dragons

And the return of fire magic to said priest

[Tyryan Lannister]

While you do make a point about it being magic, we aren't talking about people knowing about it. We are talking about a hiddened beings of magic knowing and doing things to prepare for its coming.

If we believe that all these "chess" peices were put in to play before it came, something did infact know that it was coming.

for Ice

the Others returning

Direwolves being sent south of the Wall.

A return of Wargs to the Starks

For Fire

Red Priest in Westeros

Setting up the birth of Dragons

And the return of fire magic to said priest

Agreed... think we're just arguing semantics now

[zelatorn]

dammit. how could i have missed this. just finished the second book(AGAIN). robb is called king of the north, the previous starks were the kings of winter.the starks always had a clsoe relationship with the wall. there MUST be a reason even bran notes them as the kings of winter, and not the north. you had the kings of the rock, the kings of sstormlands ect. but those were all PLACES, not a phenomena. the starks also had the special words, winter is coming. there ust be something to that.

also, what if the WW have been gathering an army and still are? i seriously doubt them being the wild hunt, just as i doubt them waiting for the cold. they can make bodies of ice. surely they can venture south not only when its winter, as shown. they came south before winter. to me, they are an AWFULL lot calm for the wild hunt, more like the slow zombiefied hunt. im still missing the ice-spider the size of dogs as well.

also, grabbing my mythologybook here, nilfheim was the norse world of cold, and frost giants(with giants being often roughly man sized) roamed the often being rpoblematic to the gods(loki not being the least of them). seem a awfull lot alike to me. also the morrigan roaming the battlefields in celtic mythology and eating the dead(in this context, whightifying them) is a link. the long night seems a bit alike the ragnarok, with giants overthrowing the gods, roaming free and destroying ecerywhere, and after a long black epriod everything becomes good again and the few survivors can go about their buissness again

[Black Crow]

Har, slow down...

All good points and all very much at the heart of heresy. Trawl back through the threads - one a week so they're not hard to find, and you'll find all of this and more discussed.

However as to the "army" bit vis a vis the "Wild Hunt", there is a respectable body of opinion that there is no army. There are just a few white walkers, Craster's sons or no, and if they want beaters for their hunt they just raise an army of the undead, thus avoiding any need for assistance from the Iron Bank.

[Kuragin]

I'd be interested in a gathering of all the text describing actual encounters with the WW. I think having that in one place would prove illuminating.

Black Crow, do you feel there will be a Herne figure leading the Wild Hunt, a kind of cheif WW? I'm thinking also of the Wild Hunt as it appears in the mabinogion, there is a goal to that hunt (a token to win Olwen as I remember it) what could the goal of the WW be - what will signal the closing of the hunt?

[zelatorn]

i wasnt talking about an army of white walkers, more about them gathering bodies. once the wall falls, the wights decend on westeros.

anyway, if it is a wild hunt like i would like to know their target. just westeros? the world? killing till AA kicks them back again?

[Black Crow]

The point about the Wild Hunt analogy is two-fold. First there is an unquestioned assumption that sooner of later the Wall will be breaches and vast armies of White Walkers and Wights will roll south intent on eradicating all life. In reality all we've seen are individuals and hunting parties and there's therefore a certain suspicion that the threat is being exaggerated for some as yet unfathomed purposed. Secondly, and consistent with the small numbers is Old Nan's story which essentially describes how during the Long Night they first destroyed all organised resistance by using armies of wights, and then they themselves settled down to use the "dead" lands as a hunting park - not because they were eradicating the last survivors but because, as we saw in the AGoT prologue, they enjoyed the hunt, just as Ramsay Snow/Bolton does, although that's a line of discussion in its own right.

[Black Crow]

I'd be interested in a gathering of all the text describing actual encounters with the WW. I think having that in one place would prove illuminating.

Your wish is my command:

Professor Crow’s dissertation on the Others (updated version)

There are so far only two physical descriptions of White Walkers in text; first in the prologue to AGoT and then in the fight below the Fist.

The Others made no sound.

Will saw movement from the corner of his eye. Pale shapes gliding through the wood. He turned his head, saw a white shadow in the darkness. Then it was gone…

A shadow emerged from the dark of the wood. It stood in front of Royce. Tall, it was, and gaunt and hard as old bones, with flesh pale as milk. Its armor seemed to change color as it moved; here it was white as new-fallen snow, there black as shadow, everywhere dappled with the deep grey-green of the trees. The patterns ran like moonlight on the water with every step it took.

The Other slid forward on silent feet. In its hand was a longsword like none Will had ever seen. No human metal had gone into the forging of that blade. It was alive with moonlight, translucent, a shard of crystal so thin that it seemed almost to vanish when seen edge-on. There was a faint blue shimmer to the thing, a ghost-light that played around its edges, and somehow Will knew it was sharper than any razor.

The Other halted. Will saw its eyes; blue, deeper and bluer than any human eyes, a blue that burned like ice.

Behind him, to right, to left, all around him the watchers stood patient, faceless, silent, the shifting patterns of their delicate armor making them all but invisible in the wood. Yet they made no move to interfere.

The Other said something in a language that Will did not know, his voice was like the cracking of ice on a winter lake, and the words were mocking.

The watchers moved forward together, as if some signal had been given. Swords rose and fell, all in a deathly silence. It was cold butchery. The pale blades sliced through ringmail as if it were silk. Will closed his eyes. Far beneath him, he heard their voices and laughter sharp as icicles.

Then there’s Sam and Grenn in the retreat from the Fist as told in Storm of Swords 1:

On its back was a rider pale as ice… The Other slid gracefully from the saddle to stand upon the snow. Sword slim it was, and milky white. Its armor rippled and shifted as it moved, and its feet did not break the crust of the new fallen snow…

“Get away!” Grenn took a step, thrusting the torch out before him. “Away or you burn.” He poked at it with the flames.

The Other’s sword gleamed with a faint blue glow. It moved toward Grenn, lightning quick, slashing. When the ice blue blade brushed the flames, a screech stabbed Sam’s ears sharp as a needle. The head of the torch tumbled sideways to vanish beneath a deep drift of snow…

The wights had been slow clumsy things but the Other was light as snow on the wind. It slid away from Paul’s axe, armour rippling, and its crystal sword twisted and spun and slipped through the iron rings of Paul’s mail, through leather and wool and bone and flesh. It came out his back with a hissssssssssss and Sam heard Paul say “Oh” as he lost the axe. Impaled, his blood smoking around the sword, the big man tried to reach his killer with his hands and almost had before he fell. The weight of him tore the strange pale sword from the Other’s grip…

And then he was stumbling forward, falling more than running, really, closing his eyes and shoving the dagger blindly out before him with both hands. He heard a crack, like the sound ice makes when it breaks beneath a man’s foot, and then a screech so shrill and sharp that he went staggering backward with his hands over his muffled ears, and fell hard on his arse.

When he opened his eyes the Other’s armor was running down its legs in rivulets as pale blue blood hissed and steamed around the black dragonglass dagger in its throat. It reached down with two bone-white hands to pull out the knife, but where its fingers touched the obsidian they smoked.

Sam rolled onto his side, eyes wide as the Other shrank and puddled, dissolving away. In twenty heartbeats its flesh was gone, swirling away in a fine white mist. Beneath were bones like milkglass, pale and shiny, and they were melting too. Finally only the dragonglass dagger remained, wreathed in steam as if it were alive and sweating. Grenn bent to scoop it up and flung it down again at once. “Mother, that’s cold!”

In both passages we can see they are tall, gaunt and hard featured with white skin and bright blue eyes, wearing stealth armour like that said by Maester Luwin to have been worn by the Wood Dancers

In place of mail, they wore long shirts of woven leaves and bound their legs in bark, so they seemed to melt into the wood.

We’ll come back to this melting into the wood in a moment, because now we also have a third description, provided by GRRM to the comic book artist Tommy Patterson:

“I had many talks with George. He told me of the ice swords, and the reflective, camouflaging armor that picks up the images of the things around it like a clear, still pond. He spoke a lot about what they were not, but what they were was harder to put into words. Here is what George said, in one e-mail: The Others are not dead. They are strange, beautiful… think, oh… the Sidhe made of ice, something like that… a different sort of life… inhuman, elegant, dangerous.”

Essentially this is all we've got, although its worth recalling Gilly's describing those visiting Craster's place as the Cold Gods and having bright blue eyes, and the similar description of the Faerie Queen who entranced the Nights King.

At a more prosaic level there's also Mormont's remark to Tyrion about fishermen reporting White Walkers on the shore near Eastwatch in a very matter of fact way, more suggestive of not seeing them so far south at this time of year rather than bar the gates and lock up your daughters because the Others are coming, and his grumbling to Jon about White Shadows in the woods.

[Black Crow]

Just an odd question following from that last para. Mormont speaks of White Walkers and White Shadows. Does he ever refer to them as the Others?

[JonNonRegis]

However as to the "army" bit vis a vis the "Wild Hunt", there is a respectable body of opinion that there is no army. There are just a few white walkers, Craster's sons or no, and if they want beaters for their hunt they just raise an army of the undead, thus avoiding any need for assistance from the Iron Bank.

Spot on.

Furthermore, that army appears to consist of any formerly-living creatures in an adequately-preserved physical state. It's not about the age, or the species, but the state of preservation.

So conceivably, just as an extreme instance, dead mammoths from 20K years back could be wighted, if their bodies are in an appropriate state and close enough to the surface (as has repeatedly been the case in our world).

The "dead things in the water" off Hardhome could well be wighted sea creatures. Krakens suggest themselves as compelling possibilities. A wighted sea dragon such as Nagga (if those bones are a sea dragon at all) would certainly be interesting as well.

Also, I propose adding to the introductory text:

leading us through the Mabinogion, the Tain bo Culaidh and the Norse Eddas amongst others to discover Bran the Blessed

with this

and his compatriot, the similarly-named Brian the Blessed

[alienarea]

Since the White Walkers do not break the crust of the snow they walk on

1) they are either lighter than snow and don't touch it => they are gaslike, i.e. mist

2) they have the same molecular structure as snow, i.e. water (which made me assume they were of aquatic origin circa H13)

[Black Crow]

I'm very inclined to go with the first option given their association with the cold winds and mists. Even if they were of the same molecular structure as snow they would still have the weight to break the crust - snow isn't exactly light.

Its the Storm God/Goddess of the Wind who they serve, not the Drowned one.

[EmmaoftheCanals]

The (almost) closing words of aCoK (when Bran looks back at Winterfell for the last time).

the roots of the trees go deep, and under the ground the Kings of Winter sit their thrones

Reminded me of what he's going to be doing three books down the line...

On a non-heretic side note: was Hodor born the way he is, or dit he suffer brain damage resulting in some kind of Broca's afasia and other symptoms of simletonicity? I kind remember anything in the text pointing to either option...

[EmmaoftheCanals]

I'm very inclined to go with the first option given their association with the cold winds and mists.

Since Dragons are fire made flesh it would be a nice symmetry if the WW were ice made flesh... But of course, it would be even nicer if dragons could appear and disappear in flames... (Which they don't, though it would be kind of bad-ass).

[Teak]

Just an odd question following from that last para. Mormont speaks of White Walkers and White Shadows. Does he ever refer to them as the Others?

No, he never does.